As part of its capacity building and readiness to effectively respond to disasters, particularly earthquakes, the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO) in collaboration with the North Dakota National Guard have a commenced a full scale simulation exercise in Accra.

At the opening of the five-day exercise held on 7th May, 20118 at the Head Office of NADMO, Mr. Ambrose Dery, Minister for the Interior, in a speech read on his behalf, revealed that the simulation exercise is a bold step towards an unpredictable but real journey to responding to an earthquake disaster.

According to Mr. Dery, Ghana has recorded some earthquakes with the last destructive earthquake of magnitude 6.5 occurring in 1939, hence the need for Ghana to prepare itself and build the resilience to withstand a future earthquake that would not grind the country to a total halt.

The  Minister accordingly urged all the participating Agencies to take the exercise serious and learn all that there is to be learnt.

He expressed his appreciation to the United States Africa Command and the North Dakota National Guard for their commitment to the exercise in respect of funds and human resources.

The Minister for Defence, Hon. Dominic Nitiwul in his remarks, appealed to Ghanaians to give the facilitators and participants all the needed support and cooperation during the exercise.

He pledged the Ghana Armed Forces support and readiness to assist in any way possible to make the exercise successful.

The simulation exercise would be staged at the Accra Sports Stadium and would involve agencies such as the Ghana Police Service, the Ghana National Fire Service, the Ghana Armed Forces, operatives from National Security and the Ghana Ambulance Services.